CHAPTER III.
THE PLAYMATES.
Mr. Home stayed two days. During his visit he could not be prevailed onto go out: he sat all day long by the fireside, sometimes silent,sometimes receiving and answering Mrs. Bretton's chat, which was justof the proper sort for a man in his morbid mood--not over-sympathetic,yet not too uncongenial, sensible; and even with a touch of themotherly--she was sufficiently his senior to be permitted this touch.
As to Paulina, the child was at once happy and mute, busy and watchful.Her father frequently lifted her to his knee; she would sit there tillshe felt or fancied he grew restless; then it was--”Papa, put me down;I shall tire you with my weight.”
And the mighty burden slid to the rug, and establishing itself oncarpet or stool just at ”papa's” feet, the white work-box and thescarlet-speckled handkerchief came into play. This handkerchief, itseems, was intended as a keepsake for ”papa,” and must be finishedbefore his departure; consequently the demand on the sempstress'sindustry (she accomplished about a score of stitches in half-an-hour)was stringent.
The evening, by restoring Graham to the maternal roof (his days werepassed at school), brought us an accession of animation--a quality notdiminished by the nature of the scenes pretty sure to be enactedbetween him and Miss Paulina.
A distant and haughty demeanour had been the result of the indignityput upon her the first evening of his arrival: her usual answer, whenhe addressed her, was--”I can't attend to you; I have other things tothink about.” Being implored to state _what_ things:
”Business.”
Graham would endeavour to seduce her attention by opening his desk anddisplaying its multifarious contents: seals, bright sticks of wax,pen-knives, with a miscellany of engravings--some of them gailycoloured--which he had amassed from time to time. Nor was this powerfultemptation wholly unavailing: her eyes, furtively raised from her work,cast many a peep towards the writing-table, rich in scattered pictures.An etching of a child playing with a Blenheim spaniel happened toflutter to the floor.
”Pretty little dog!” said she, delighted.
Graham prudently took no notice. Ere long, stealing from her corner,she approached to examine the treasure more closely. The dog's greateyes and long ears, and the child's hat and feathers, were irresistible.
”Nice picture!” was her favourable criticism.
”Well--you may have it,” said Graham.
She seemed to hesitate. The wish to possess was strong, but to acceptwould be a compromise of dignity. No. She put it down and turned away.
”You won't have it, then, Polly?”
”I would rather not, thank you.”
”Shall I tell you what I will do with the picture if you refuse it?”
She half turned to listen.
”Cut it into strips for lighting the taper.”
”No!”
”But I shall.”
”Please--don't.”
Graham waxed inexorable on hearing the pleading tone; he took thescissors from his mother's work-basket.
”Here goes!” said he, making a menacing flourish. ”Right through Fido'shead, and splitting little Harry's nose.”
”No! _No!_ NO!”
”Then come to me. Come quickly, or it is done.”
She hesitated, lingered, but complied.
”Now, will you have it?” he asked, as she stood before him.
”Please.”
”But I shall want payment.”
”How much?”
”A kiss.”
”Give the picture first into my hand.”
Polly, as she said this, looked rather faithless in her turn. Grahamgave it. She absconded a debtor, darted to her father, and took refugeon his knee. Graham rose in mimic wrath and followed. She buried herface in Mr. Home's waistcoat.
”Papa--papa--send him away!”
”I'll not be sent away,” said Graham.
With face still averted, she held out her hand to keep him off
”Then, I shall kiss the hand,” said he; but that moment it became aminiature fist, and dealt him payment in a small coin that was notkisses.
Graham--not failing in his way to be as wily as his littleplaymate--retreated apparently quite discomfited; he flung himself on asofa, and resting his head against the cushion, lay like one in pain.Polly, finding him silent, presently peeped at him. His eyes and facewere covered with his hands. She turned on her father's knee, and gazedat her foe anxiously and long. Graham groaned.
”Papa, what is the matter?” she whispered.
”You had better ask him, Polly.”
”Is he hurt?” (groan second.)
”He makes a noise as if he were,” said Mr. Home.
”Mother,” suggested Graham, feebly, ”I think you had better send forthe doctor. Oh my eye!” (renewed silence, broken only by sighs fromGraham.)
”If I were to become blind----?” suggested this last.
His chastiser could not bear the suggestion. She was beside himdirectly.
”Let me see your eye: I did not mean to touch it, only your mouth; andI did not think I hit so _very_ hard.”
Silence answered her. Her features worked,--”I am sorry; I am sorry!”
Then succeeded emotion, faltering; weeping.
”Have done trying that child, Graham,” said Mrs. Bretton.
”It is all nonsense, my pet,” cried Mr. Home.
And Graham once more snatched her aloft, and she again punished him;and while she pulled his lion's locks, termed him--”The naughtiest,rudest, worst, untruest person that ever was.”
* * * * *
On the morning of Mr. Home's departure, he and his daughter had someconversation in a window-recess by themselves; I heard part of it.
”Couldn't I pack my box and go with you, papa?” she whispered earnestly.
He shook his head.
”Should I be a trouble to you?”
”Yes, Polly.”
”Because I am little?”
”Because you are little and tender. It is only great, strong peoplethat should travel. But don't look sad, my little girl; it breaks myheart. Papa, will soon come back to his Polly.”
”Indeed, indeed, I am not sad, scarcely at all.”
”Polly would be sorry to give papa pain; would she not?”
”Sorrier than sorry.”
”Then Polly must be cheerful: not cry at parting; not fret afterwards.She must look forward to meeting again, and try to be happy meanwhile.Can she do this?”
”She will try.”
”I see she will. Farewell, then. It is time to go.”
”_Now_?--just _now_?
”Just now.”
She held up quivering lips. Her father sobbed, but she, I remarked, didnot. Having put her down, he shook hands with the rest present, anddeparted.
When the street-door closed, she dropped on her knees at a chair with acry--”Papa!”
It was low and long; a sort of ”Why hast thou forsaken me?” During anensuing space of some minutes, I perceived she endured agony. She wentthrough, in that brief interval of her infant life, emotions such assome never feel; it was in her constitution: she would have more ofsuch instants if she lived. Nobody spoke. Mrs. Bretton, being a mother,shed a tear or two. Graham, who was writing, lifted up his eyes andgazed at her. I, Lucy Snowe, was calm.
The little creature, thus left unharassed, did for herself what noneother could do--contended with an intolerable feeling; and, ere long,in some degree, repressed it. That day she would accept solace fromnone; nor the next day: she grew more passive afterwards.
On the third evening, as she sat on the floor, worn and quiet, Graham,coming in, took her up gently, without a word. She did not resist: sherather nestled in his arms, as if weary. When he sat down, she laid herhead against him; in a few minutes she slept; he carried her upstairsto bed. I was not surprised that, the next morning, the first thing shedemanded was, ”Where is Mr. Graham?”
It happened that Graham was not coming to the breakfast-table; he hadsome exercises to write for that morning's class, and had requested hismother to send a cup of tea into the study. Polly volunteered to carryit: she must be busy about something, look after somebody. The cup wasentrusted to her; for, if restless, she was also careful. As the studywas opposite the breakfast-room, the doors facing across the passage,my eye followed her.
”What are you doing?” she asked, pausing on the threshold.
”Writing,” said Graham.
”Why don't you come to take breakfast with your mamma?”
”Too busy.”
”Do you want any breakfast?”
”Of course.”
”There, then.”
And she deposited the cup on the carpet, like a jailor putting aprisoner's pitcher of water through his cell-door, and retreated.Presently she returned.
”What will you have besides tea--what to eat?”
”Anything good. Bring me something particularly nice; that's a kindlittle woman.”
She came back to Mrs. Bretton.
”Please, ma'am, send your boy something good.”
”You shall choose for him, Polly; what shall my boy have?”
She selected a portion of whatever was best on the table; and, erelong, came back with a whispered request for some marmalade, which wasnot there. Having got it, however, (for Mrs. Bretton refused the pairnothing), Graham was shortly after heard lauding her to the skies;promising that, when he had a house of his own, she should be hishousekeeper, and perhaps--if she showed any culinary genius--his cook;and, as she did not return, and I went to look after her, I foundGraham and her breakfasting _tete-a-tete_--she standing at his elbow,and sharing his fare: excepting the marmalade, which she delicatelyrefused to touch, lest, I suppose, it should appear that she hadprocured it as much on her own account as his. She constantly evincedthese nice perceptions and delicate instincts.
The league of acquaintanceship thus struck up was not hastilydissolved; on the contrary, it appeared that time and circumstancesserved rather to cement than loosen it. Ill-assimilated as the two werein age, sex, pursuits, &c., they somehow found a great deal to say toeach other. As to Paulina, I observed that her little character neverproperly came out, except with young Bretton. As she got settled, andaccustomed to the house, she proved tractable enough with Mrs. Bretton;but she would sit on a stool at that lady's feet all day long, learningher task, or sewing, or drawing figures with a pencil on a slate, andnever kindling once to originality, or showing a single gleam of thepeculiarities of her nature. I ceased to watch her under suchcircumstances: she was not interesting. But the moment Graham's knocksounded of an evening, a change occurred; she was instantly at the headof the staircase. Usually her welcome was a reprimand or a threat.
”You have not wiped your shoes properly on the mat. I shall tell yourmamma.”
”Little busybody! Are you there?”
”Yes--and you can't reach me: I am higher up than you” (peeping betweenthe rails of the banister; she could not look over them).
”Polly!”
”My dear boy!” (such was one of her terms for him, adopted in imitationof his mother.)
”I am fit to faint with fatigue,” declared Graham, leaning against thepassage-wall in seeming exhaustion. ”Dr. Digby” (the headmaster) ”hasquite knocked me up with overwork. Just come down and help me to carryup my books.”
”Ah! you're cunning!”
”Not at all, Polly--it is positive fact. I'm as weak as a rush. Comedown.”
”Your eyes are quiet like the cat's, but you'll spring.”
”Spring? Nothing of the kind: it isn't in me. Come down.”
”Perhaps I may--if you'll promise not to touch--not to snatch me up,and not to whirl me round.”
”I? I couldn't do it!” (sinking into a chair.)
”Then put the books down on the first step, and go three yards off”
This being done, she descended warily, and not taking her eyes from thefeeble Graham. Of course her approach always galvanized him to new andspasmodic life: the game of romps was sure to be exacted. Sometimes shewould be angry; sometimes the matter was allowed to pass smoothly, andwe could hear her say as she led him up-stairs: ”Now, my dear boy, comeand take your tea--I am sure you must want something.”
It was sufficiently comical to observe her as she sat beside Graham,while he took that meal. In his absence she was a still personage, butwith him the most officious, fidgety little body possible. I oftenwished she would mind herself and be tranquil; but no--herself wasforgotten in him: he could not be sufficiently well waited on, norcarefully enough looked after; he was more than the Grand Turk in herestimation. She would gradually assemble the various plates before him,and, when one would suppose all he could possibly desire was within hisreach, she would find out something else: ”Ma'am,” she would whisper toMrs. Bretton,--”perhaps your son would like a little cake--sweet cake,you know--there is some in there” (pointing to the sideboard cupboard).Mrs. Bretton, as a rule, disapproved of sweet cake at tea, but stillthe request was urged,--”One little piece--only for him--as he goes toschool: girls--such as me and Miss Snowe--don't need treats, but _he_would like it.”
Graham did like it very well, and almost always got it. To do himjustice, he would have shared his prize with her to whom he owed it;but that was never allowed: to insist, was to ruffle her for theevening. To stand by his knee, and monopolize his talk and notice, wasthe reward she wanted--not a share of the cake.
With curious readiness did she adapt herself to such themes asinterested him. One would have thought the child had no mind or life ofher own, but must necessarily live, move, and have her being inanother: now that her father was taken from her, she nestled to Graham,and seemed to feel by his feelings: to exist in his existence. Shelearned the names of all his schoolfellows in a trice: she got by hearttheir characters as given from his lips: a single description of anindividual seemed to suffice. She never forgot, or confused identities:she would talk with him the whole evening about people she had neverseen, and appear completely to realise their aspect, manners, anddispositions. Some she learned to mimic: an under-master, who was anaversion of young Bretton's, had, it seems, some peculiarities, whichshe caught up in a moment from Graham's representation, and rehearsedfor his amusement; this, however, Mrs. Bretton disapproved and forbade.
The pair seldom quarrelled; yet once a rupture occurred, in which herfeelings received a severe shock.
One day Graham, on the occasion of his birthday, had some friends--ladsof his own age--to dine with him. Paulina took much interest in thecoming of these friends; she had frequently heard of them; they wereamongst those of whom Graham oftenest spoke. After dinner, the younggentlemen were left by themselves in the dining-room, where they soonbecame very merry and made a good deal of noise. Chancing to passthrough the hall, I found Paulina sitting alone on the lowest step ofthe staircase, her eyes fixed on the glossy panels of the dining-roomdoor, where the reflection of the hall-lamp was shining; her littlebrow knit in anxious, meditation.
”What are you thinking about, Polly?”
”Nothing particular; only I wish that door was clear glass--that Imight see through it. The boys seem very cheerful, and I want to go tothem: I want to be with Graham, and watch his friends.”
”What hinders you from going?”
”I feel afraid: but may I try, do you think? May I knock at the door,and ask to be let in?”
I thought perhaps they might not object to have her as a playmate, andtherefore encouraged the attempt.
She knocked--too faintly at first to be heard, but on a second essaythe door unclosed; Graham's head appeared; he looked in high spirits,but impatient.
”What do you want, you little monkey?”
”To come to you.”
”Do you indeed? As if I would be troubled with you! Away to mamma andMistress Snowe, and tell them to put you to bed.” The auburn head andbright flushed face vanished,--the door shut peremptorily. She wasstunned.
”Why does he speak so? He never spoke so before,” she said inconsternation. ”What have I done?”
”Nothing, Polly; but Graham is busy with his school-friends.”
”And he likes them better than me! He turns me away now they are here!”
I had some thoughts of consoling her, and of improving the occasion byinculcating some of those maxims of philosophy whereof I had ever atolerable stock ready for application. She stopped me, however, byputting her fingers in her ears at the first words I uttered, and thenlying down on the mat with her face against the flags; nor could eitherWarren or the cook root her from that position: she was allowed to lie,therefore, till she chose to rise of her own accord.
Graham forgot his impatience the same evening, and would have accostedher as usual when his friends were gone, but she wrenched herself fromhis hand; her eye quite flashed; she would not bid him good-night; shewould not look in his face. The next day he treated her withindifference, and she grew like a bit of marble. The day after, heteased her to know what was the matter; her lips would not unclose. Ofcourse he could not feel real anger on his side: the match was toounequal in every way; he tried soothing and coaxing. ”Why was she soangry? What had he done?” By-and-by tears answered him; he petted her,and they were friends. But she was one on whom such incidents were notlost: I remarked that never after this rebuff did she seek him, orfollow him, or in any way solicit his notice. I told her once to carrya book or some other article to Graham when he was shut up in his study.
”I shall wait till he comes out,” said she, proudly; ”I don't choose togive him the trouble of rising to open the door.”
Young Bretton had a favourite pony on which he often rode out; from thewindow she always watched his departure and return. It was her ambitionto be permitted to have a ride round the courtyard on this pony; butfar be it from her to ask such a favour. One day she descended to theyard to watch him dismount; as she leaned against the gate, the longingwish for the indulgence of a ride glittered in her eye.
”Come, Polly, will you have a canter?” asked Graham, half carelessly.
I suppose she thought he was _too_ careless.
”No, thank you,” said she, turning away with the utmost coolness.
”You'd better,” pursued he. ”You will like it, I am sure.”
”Don't think I should care a fig about it,” was the response.
”That is not true. You told Lucy Snowe you longed to have a ride.”
”Lucy Snowe is a _tatter_-box,” I heard her say (her imperfectarticulation was the least precocious thing she had about her); andwith this; she walked into the house.
Graham, coming in soon after, observed to his mother,--”Mamma, Ibelieve that creature is a changeling: she is a perfect cabinet ofoddities; but I should be dull without her: she amuses me a great dealmore than you or Lucy Snowe.”
* * * * *
”Miss Snowe,” said Paulina to me (she had now got into the habit ofoccasionally chatting with me when we were alone in our room at night),”do you know on what day in the week I like Graham best?”
”How can I possibly know anything so strange? Is there one day out ofthe seven when he is otherwise than on the other six?”
”To be sure! Can't you see? Don't you know? I find him the mostexcellent on a Sunday; then we have him the whole day, and he is quiet,and, in the evening, _so_ kind.”
This observation was not altogether groundless: going to church, &c.,kept Graham quiet on the Sunday, and the evening he generally dedicatedto a serene, though rather indolent sort of enjoyment by the parlourfireside. He would take possession of the couch, and then he would callPolly.
Graham was a boy not quite as other boys are; all his delight did notlie in action: he was capable of some intervals of contemplation; hecould take a pleasure too in reading, nor was his selection of bookswholly indiscriminate: there were glimmerings of characteristicpreference, and even of instinctive taste in the choice. He rarely, itis true, remarked on what he read, but I have seen him sit and think ofit.
Polly, being near him, kneeling on a little cushion or the carpet, aconversation would begin in murmurs, not inaudible, though subdued. Icaught a snatch of their tenor now and then; and, in truth, someinfluence better and finer than that of every day, seemed to sootheGraham at such times into no ungentle mood.
”Have you learned any hymns this week, Polly?”
”I have learned a very pretty one, four verses long. Shall I say it?”
”Speak nicely, then: don't be in a hurry.”
The hymn being rehearsed, or rather half-chanted, in a little singingvoice, Graham would take exceptions at the manner, and proceed to givea lesson in recitation. She was quick in learning, apt in imitating;and, besides, her pleasure was to please Graham: she proved a readyscholar. To the hymn would succeed some reading--perhaps a chapter inthe Bible; correction was seldom required here, for the child couldread any simple narrative chapter very well; and, when the subject wassuch as she could understand and take an interest in, her expressionand emphasis were something remarkable. Joseph cast into the pit; thecalling of Samuel; Daniel in the lions' den;--these were favouritepassages: of the first especially she seemed perfectly to feel thepathos.
”Poor Jacob!” she would sometimes say, with quivering lips. ”How heloved his son Joseph! As much,” she once added--”as much, Graham, as Ilove you: if you were to die” (and she re-opened the book, sought theverse, and read), ”I should refuse to be comforted, and go down intothe grave to you mourning.”
With these words she gathered Graham in her little arms, drawing hislong-tressed head towards her. The action, I remember, struck me asstrangely rash; exciting the feeling one might experience on seeing ananimal dangerous by nature, and but half-tamed by art, too heedlesslyfondled. Not that I feared Graham would hurt, or very roughly checkher; but I thought she ran risk of incurring such a careless, impatientrepulse, as would be worse almost to her than a blow. On the whole,however, these demonstrations were borne passively: sometimes even asort of complacent wonder at her earnest partiality would smile notunkindly in his eyes. Once he said:--”You like me almost as well as ifyou were my little sister, Polly.”
”Oh! I _do_ like you,” said she; ”I _do_ like you very much.”
I was not long allowed the amusement of this study of character. Shehad scarcely been at Bretton two months, when a letter came from Mr.Home, signifying that he was now settled amongst his maternal kinsfolkon the Continent; that, as England was become wholly distasteful tohim, he had no thoughts of returning hither, perhaps, for years; andthat he wished his little girl to join him immediately.
”I wonder how she will take this news?” said Mrs. Bretton, when she hadread the letter. _I_ wondered, too, and I took upon myself tocommunicate it.
Repairing to the drawing-room--in which calm and decorated apartmentshe was fond of being alone, and where she could be implicitly trusted,for she fingered nothing, or rather soiled nothing she fingered--Ifound her seated, like a little Odalisque, on a couch, half shaded bythe drooping draperies of the window near. She seemed happy; all herappliances for occupation were about her; the white wood workbox, ashred or two of muslin, an end or two of ribbon collected forconversion into doll-millinery. The doll, duly night-capped andnight-gowned, lay in its cradle; she was rocking it to sleep, with anair of the most perfect faith in its possession of sentient andsomnolent faculties; her eyes, at the same time, being engaged with apicture-book, which lay open on her lap.
”Miss Snowe,” said she in a whisper, ”this is a wonderful book.Candace” (the doll, christened by Graham; for, indeed, its begrimedcomplexion gave it much of an Ethiopian aspect)--”Candace is asleepnow, and I may tell you about it; only we must both speak low, lest sheshould waken. This book was given me by Graham; it tells about distantcountries, a long, long way from England, which no traveller can reachwithout sailing thousands of miles over the sea. Wild men live in thesecountries, Miss Snowe, who wear clothes different from ours: indeed,some of them wear scarcely any clothes, for the sake of being cool, youknow; for they have very hot weather. Here is a picture of thousandsgathered in a desolate place--a plain, spread with sand--round a man inblack,--a good, _good_ Englishman--a missionary, who is preaching tothem under a palm-tree.” (She showed a little coloured cut to thateffect.) ”And here are pictures” (she went on) ”more stranger” (grammarwas occasionally forgotten) ”than that. There is the wonderful GreatWall of China; here is a Chinese lady, with a foot littler than mine.There is a wild horse of Tartary; and here, most strange of all--is aland of ice and snow, without green fields, woods, or gardens. In thisland, they found some mammoth bones: there are no mammoths now. Youdon't know what it was; but I can tell you, because Graham told me. Amighty, goblin creature, as high as this room, and as long as the hall;but not a fierce, flesh-eating thing, Graham thinks. He believes, if Imet one in a forest, it would not kill me, unless I came quite in itsway; when it would trample me down amongst the bushes, as I might treadon a grasshopper in a hayfield without knowing it.”
Thus she rambled on.
”Polly,” I interrupted, ”should you like to travel?”
”Not just yet,” was the prudent answer; ”but perhaps in twenty years,when I am grown a woman, as tall as Mrs. Bretton, I may travel withGraham. We intend going to Switzerland, and climbing Mount Blanck; andsome day we shall sail over to South America, and walk to the top ofKim-kim-borazo.”
”But how would you like to travel now, if your papa was with you?”
Her reply--not given till after a pause--evinced one of thoseunexpected turns of temper peculiar to her.
”Where is the good of talking in that silly way?” said she. ”Why do youmention papa? What is papa to you? I was just beginning to be happy,and not think about him so much; and there it will be all to do overagain!”
Her lip trembled. I hastened to disclose the fact of a letter havingbeen received, and to mention the directions given that she and Harrietshould immediately rejoin this dear papa. ”Now, Polly, are you notglad?” I added.
She made no answer. She dropped her book and ceased to rock her doll;she gazed at me with gravity and earnestness.
”Shall not you like to go to papa?”
”Of course,” she said at last in that trenchant manner she usuallyemployed in speaking to me; and which was quite different from that sheused with Mrs. Bretton, and different again from the one dedicated toGraham. I wished to ascertain more of what she thought but no: shewould converse no more. Hastening to Mrs. Bretton, she questioned her,and received the confirmation of my news. The weight and importance ofthese tidings kept her perfectly serious the whole day. In the evening,at the moment Graham's entrance was heard below, I found her at myside. She began to arrange a locket-ribbon about my neck, she displacedand replaced the comb in my hair; while thus busied, Graham entered.
”Tell him by-and-by,” she whispered; ”tell him I am going.”
In the course of tea-time I made the desired communication. Graham, itchanced, was at that time greatly preoccupied about some school-prize,for which he was competing. The news had to be told twice before ittook proper hold of his attention, and even then he dwelt on it butmomently.
”Polly going? What a pity! Dear little Mousie, I shall be sorry to loseher: she must come to us again, mamma.”
And hastily swallowing his tea, he took a candle and a small table tohimself and his books, and was soon buried in study.
”Little Mousie” crept to his side, and lay down on the carpet at hisfeet, her face to the floor; mute and motionless she kept that post andposition till bed-time. Once I saw Graham--wholly unconscious of herproximity--push her with his restless foot. She receded an inch or two.A minute after one little hand stole out from beneath her face, towhich it had been pressed, and softly caressed the heedless foot. Whensummoned by her nurse she rose and departed very obediently, having bidus all a subdued good-night.
I will not say that I dreaded going to bed, an hour later; yet Icertainly went with an unquiet anticipation that I should find thatchild in no peaceful sleep. The forewarning of my instinct was butfulfilled, when I discovered her, all cold and vigilant, perched like awhite bird on the outside of the bed. I scarcely knew how to accosther; she was not to be managed like another child. She, however,accosted me. As I closed the door, and put the light on thedressing-table, she turned to me with these words:--”I cannot--_cannot_sleep; and in this way I cannot--_cannot_ live!”
I asked what ailed her.
”Dedful miz-er-y!” said she, with her piteous lisp.
”Shall I call Mrs. Bretton?”
”That is downright silly,” was her impatient reply; and, indeed, I wellknew that if she had heard Mrs. Bretton's foot approach, she would havenestled quiet as a mouse under the bedclothes. Whilst lavishing hereccentricities regardlessly before me--for whom she professed scarcelythe semblance of affection--she never showed my godmother one glimpseof her inner self: for her, she was nothing but a docile, somewhatquaint little maiden. I examined her; her cheek was crimson; herdilated eye was both troubled and glowing, and painfully restless: inthis state it was obvious she must not be left till morning. I guessedhow the case stood.
”Would you like to bid Graham good-night again?” I asked. ”He is notgone to his room yet.”
She at once stretched out her little arms to be lifted. Folding a shawlround her, I carried her back to the drawing-room. Graham was justcoming out.
”She cannot sleep without seeing and speaking to you once more,” Isaid. ”She does not like the thought of leaving you.”
”I've spoilt her,” said he, taking her from me with good humour, andkissing her little hot face and burning lips. ”Polly, you care for memore than for papa, now--”
”I _do_ care for you, but you care nothing for me,” was her whisper.
She was assured to the contrary, again kissed, restored to me, and Icarried her away; but, alas! not soothed.
When I thought she could listen to me, I said--”Paulina, you should notgrieve that Graham does not care for you so much as you care for him.It must be so.”
Her lifted and questioning eyes asked why.
”Because he is a boy and you are a girl; he is sixteen and you are onlysix; his nature is strong and gay, and yours is otherwise.”
”But I love him so much; he _should_ love me a little.”
”He does. He is fond of you. You are his favourite.”
”Am I Graham's favourite?”
”Yes, more than any little child I know.”
The assurance soothed her; she smiled in her anguish.
”But,” I continued, ”don't fret, and don't expect too much of him, orelse he will feel you to be troublesome, and then it is all over.”
”All over!” she echoed softly; ”then I'll be good. I'll try to be good,Lucy Snowe.”
I put her to bed.
”Will he forgive me this one time?” she asked, as I undressed myself. Iassured her that he would; that as yet he was by no means alienated;that she had only to be careful for the future.
”There is no future,” said she: ”I am going. Shall I ever--ever--seehim again, after I leave England?”
I returned an encouraging response. The candle being extinguished, astill half-hour elapsed. I thought her asleep, when the little whiteshape once more lifted itself in the crib, and the small voiceasked--”Do you like Graham, Miss Snowe?”
”Like him! Yes, a little.”
”Only a little! Do you like him as I do?”
”I think not. No: not as you do.”
”Do you like him much?”
”I told you I liked him a little. Where is the use of caring for him sovery much: he is full of faults.”
”Is he?”
”All boys are.”
”More than girls?”
”Very likely. Wise people say it is folly to think anybody perfect; andas to likes and dislikes, we should be friendly to all, and worshipnone.”
”Are you a wise person?”
”I mean to try to be so. Go to sleep.”
”I _cannot_ go to sleep. Have you no pain just here” (laying her elfishhand on her elfish breast,) ”when you think _you_ shall have to leaveGraham; for _your_ home is not here?”
”Surely, Polly,” said I, ”you should not feel so much pain when you arevery soon going to rejoin your father. Have you forgotten him? Do youno longer wish to be his little companion?”
Dead silence succeeded this question.
”Child, lie down and sleep,” I urged.
”My bed is cold,” said she. ”I can't warm it.”
I saw the little thing shiver. ”Come to me,” I said, wishing, yetscarcely hoping, that she would comply: for she was a most strange,capricious, little creature, and especially whimsical with me. Shecame, however, instantly, like a small ghost gliding over the carpet. Itook her in. She was chill: I warmed her in my arms. She tremblednervously; I soothed her. Thus tranquillized and cherished she at lastslumbered.
”A very unique child,” thought I, as I viewed her sleeping countenanceby the fitful moonlight, and cautiously and softly wiped her glitteringeyelids and her wet cheeks with my handkerchief. ”How will she getthrough this world, or battle with this life? How will she bear theshocks and repulses, the humiliations and desolations, which books, andmy own reason, tell me are prepared for all flesh?”
She departed the next day; trembling like a leaf when she took leave,but exercising self-command.